Stand-off over Aquarius rescue ship ends as six countries offer help

An international stand-off involving the UK over who should help 141 people stranded at sea on the Aquarius charity rescue ship has been resolved by a deal involving six countries.

Malta is to allow the Aquarius safe harbour to disembark the people on board before they are distributed to five other countries: France, Germany, Luxembourg, Portugal and Spain.

The people pulled from two wooden boats in the Mediterranean on Friday include 73 children – the majority of them unaccompanied – and two pregnant women.

Most of them are suffering from “chronic malnutrition”, according to the Doctors Without Borders group which helps run the humanitarian rescue ship.

Frédéric Penard of SOS Méditerranée, the NGO behind the Aquarius, welcomed the compromise at a press conference in Paris.

He said: “Maybe European states have finally understood that this concerns our common border at the south of Europe, that this is a problem for the 28 member states, and that we can’t avoid responsibility and should work together.”

The ship has been waiting in international waters while European countries argued over who should take responsibility.